Back to School with Blog Hoppin!

It's time for a week long linky party for back to school!

Today's prompt: Who are you? Tell us more about yourself!

So, here it goes...

I have been teaching for 6 years.

Two years in Levelland, Texas teaching Pre-K.

Two years in Mesquite, Texas at Hanby Elementary teaching 2nd grade.

Two years in Mesquite, Texas at Hanby Elementary teaching 4th grade.

I am set for another great year in 4th!

I am starting my Master in Education in Instructional Technology. It begins the same week as we do!

My husband, Kevin, is the youth minister at our church. He is a great man and I love him so much. We will celebrate 7 years of marriage this December. We started dating in high school.  :)

This was taken in 2004.

My parents are amazing people. I am thankful for them every day.

I am super proud of my little sister. She is working on her Master's and then Doctorate at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia. She is the hardest working person I know. She has spent this summer in Seoul, Korea teaching SAT Prep. She has learned that she doesn't want to be a teacher.  :)

She brings out the silly in me!

I am truly blessed to have married into a wonderful family. My sister-in-law got married last August!

This was taken last Christmas. Logan is a Children's Minister in Virginia and Bailey is a senior at Ouachita Baptist University.

These lovely ladies are my best friends at school! They keep things fun.

My husband and I do not have any kids yet. We have been struggling with infertility for the last three and a half years. We are currently working closely with a doctor and going to a lot of appointments. It has been a difficult time, but we have faith the Lord will bless us with children.

In the meantime, we have two dogs and a cat. 

Go join the party!

Teacher's Toolbox

I fought the urge for 2 years. I talked myself out of it several times.
Did I really need one of those super cute toolboxes? Did I?
No.

So even though I don't really need one, I gave in.

It was so quick and easy to do!

I decided to make my own labels. You can download them HERE if you want. As always, if you want the editable version, email me!

My classroom colors this year are aqua, blue, and gray, so I didn't have to paint the base! Winning!

Go link up HERE to see how other people decorated their toolboxes.

BTS Classroom Management Linky

So I am a week late to this party. I like linky parties! There are usually some great ones this time of year.

Here are some past posts about classroom management:

Classroom management is the determining factor on whether your students will be successful during their year with you. A teacher who doesn't have a plan will not be an effective teacher.

When I taught 2nd grade, I used the clip chart and it worked wonderfully. I know that there is some dispute about it being too punitive or embarrassing, but I didn't find that to be the case. I think it has a lot to do with how the teacher approaches it. I used it in a positive way. There was always a chance for a child to turn their day around and make better choices. I focused on that and it was a good thing in my classroom.

In 4th grade, I have focused on a classroom economy. It has been wildly successful! I love it, even thought it is a ton of work. I also like Whole Brain Teaching. I have never fully implemented all the techniques, but the ones I have work great. I have started the last two years with WBT's 5 rules and this year will be the same!

I always start the year by explicitly teaching my expectations. We practice lining up, leaving and coming into the room, walking in the hallway, raising hands, and answering questions. I encourage them and offer extra practice if they struggle to follow the expectations. I am a very strict teacher the first few weeks, as we are all getting to know each other. I can always become more lenient, but it is impossible to move the other way effectively once classroom management has taken a turn for the worst. I am not an ogre, but I hold everyone to a high standard and as the kids get used to that, I can relax a little.

This year I am stepping away from my classroom economy. I am going to try Class Dojo.

I used this toward the end of the year and I really liked it. You can customize the behaviors and message parents and kids!

Online views:

Positive behaviors that I have added for my class.

Negative behaviors for my class.

Here are some iPad views. I open the Class Dojo app, take attendance (so that absent kids won't show up that day - you don't want to give them points on days they aren't at school), and then you just tap to add or subtract points. You can give individual points or select several or all kids at the same time.

I think the messaging feature is the best! I plan on using this for parent communication a lot this year.

There are tons of free resources for Class Dojo on TPT! 

Class Dojo just made class sharing available. So if you are departmentalized, you can share your class with all the teachers.

What do you think?

Teacher Week '13 -- Classroom Tour

So... I need to take nicer pictures. I will work on that tomorrow.

I have a few other spaces I want to get pics of tomorrow. Go link up and show off your classroom!

Monday Made It :)

This is my last free Monday. 

*sigh*

Next Monday is staff development and then the next is the first day of school.

Wow.

Summer is gone.

I am going to miss these posts! I have loved sharing and learning from so many great teachers this summer!

This past week I put together my door decoration. Yay! It makes me happy.

The quotes are from the Technology Rocks. Seriously blog. She shares these for free y'all! They are my favorite. Here is a closer look at the quote art. I plugged the quotes into iPad images.

I love it!

Back to School Schedule Linky Party!

We are all in Back to School mode, so I wanted to host a schedule linky party again this year.

I love to see how other schools organize their time. Plus we can get some great ideas for how to manage our time in the classroom!

There is your button to link back to my blog!









This is what I have so far...



We received our master schedule really early this year, so this might change before our first day of school which is August 26.



I also wanted to re-share (not sure that is a word) my schedule cards.











The clipart is from Ladybug's Teacher Files.





Hopefully I will get these displayed in my room this week!





So...





Link up! I want to see your schedule. I always feel a sense of relief when I have my schedule completed or at least workable.

Back to School Goals Linky

I really love back to school time. I guess it is the feeling of newness and a clean slate. 

Or it might be the school supplies overflowing all the aisles at Walmart and Target!

I {heart} Recess is hosting a linky party for all of us who have back to school on our minds.

First of all, isn't this the cutest background? I love it!

I report for staff development on Aug. 19 and then school starts the following Monday, so I still have a little more summer. But... I have been thinking about this school year all summer. I just can't turn off my teacher brain.

Personal Goal: I am working on getting healthy. I am really overweight and I hate it. It is causing all kinds of issues, so I am changing. I have been riding my bicycle every night, last night I rode 11.12 miles!!! I can't really believe it. This school year, I am not going to be lazy and eat school lunches. I will plan ahead and bring healthy lunches and snacks!

Organization Goal: I always lose all the beginning of the year paperwork by the end of the year. You know the textbook count, technology list, parent emails, etc. It irks me every year. I have a binder all ready for those papers this year!

Planning Goal: I accomplished this goal for most of the fall semester last year, but it kinda fell apart in the spring. I am renewing this initiative because it helps relieve stress over the weekend.

Professional Goal: It is time to start working on my Master's Degree. In my school district you have 10 years to earn your Master's. They will partially fund it, but you will be let go if you have not met this requirement. I want to get an online technology degree through a reputable university. I have had a difficult time finding a program that meets those needs.

Student Goal: I want to focus on learning about each individual student in my class. I do this all year, but it is their school self that I am getting to know. I want to know about them as a person.

The motto says it all!

Go link up!

Manic Monday & Monday Made It

Hey guys! Some of you may have seen these freebies, but I wanted to share them again since I am linking up with Charity Preston at Classroom Freebies.

Go check out all the awesome freebies that are linked and maybe following a few new blogs!

Here are my freebies and if you are new to my blog I want to let you know that I don't sell anything. Everything I share is FREE. I think teachers need to share more often. If you ever want an editable copy of my resources, just email me. You can find my email in the about me section to the right of the page.

Now on to the freebies!!!

Download HERE

Download HERE

Download HERE

Please let me know if you like these freebies. I enjoy reading your comments!

I had to make a wreath! I have been seeing them everywhere.

I love chevron everything, so I made my own. I have these in another post later this week...

What do you think?

Supplies & Organization Linky

I am linking up with The Applicious Teacher again this week to talk about Supplies and Organization!

I love organization. You know that aisle in WalMart, Target, or the aisles in Office Max that are full of pretty organizational tools? That is my happy place. Don't even bring up The Container Store...

:)

Since I don't have access to my classroom right now and it is all packed up for the summer, I can't really show you too many things, but I will share some pictures and links to old posts! Here are some of my favorite ways that I have organized things in my classroom.

When I taught 2nd grade, this was one of our daily stations. Kids could use the magnetic letters and cookies sheets to create their spelling words, draw them in shaving cream, or write them with dry erase markers on page protectors.

This was my catch-all table beside my door. You can see the student mailboxes, too.

I created this as a post-it to do list. It helps keep me on point throughout the week!

I love my turn in boxes. I did decide to dump the clothes pins after a few weeks, it was just too much. I had a student record the assignment, put the papers in number order, and then record any missing papers. It was a good system.

My large cabinet at the beginning of the school year. It stayed pretty organized during the year. I tried not to put too much in here because if it isn't out where I can see it, it doesn't get used...

I kept most of my teaching resources in these binders throughout the year. About halfway through the 2nd six weeks I realized that these binders were way too small. Oh well. I ended up putting my resources in a hanging file folder box instead. I did use the red polka dot Data Notebook all year.

These were amazing this year. I tried to make all my copies for the week on the Friday before. Then I paper clipped them and put them in the correct day for the following week. That way I was set for the week. It was also a good place to store papers that were brought back to school, permission forms, completed tests, etc.

I will be doing this again this year! I pre-made birthday bags for my students. These were the bags for the boys.

This is a 3 part organization picture.

1. The outlined anchor chart area was my favorite part of my wall decorations this past year. It was so easy to hang the anchor charts by the clips!

2. My classroom library. I love books.

3. Our classroom economy was a great addition to my classroom management this past year. These were some of the fines for bad behavior.

We do a lot of journaling, so I wanted to color coordinate them for the students. Red was for reading, green was for science, purple was for writing, and yellow was for math. It made it very simple for my students to grab journals out of their desks!

Gathering supplies at the beginning of the year is always a headache. I have done it differently every year. I haven't decided on a method for this coming year...

I know that students will have supplies in their desks because I don't like having them share everything. They will give me their pencils, notebook paper, construction paper, Kleenex, manila paper, and Germ-X. 

I want them to keep their notebooks, a few pencils, 1 dry erase marker, 1 bottle of glue, scissors, 1 box of crayons, folders, and 1 highlighter and red pen. I will store the rest of their supplies until the Spring semester. When we get back from Christmas, I had hand out new supplies for those students who brought them at the beginning of the year.

Organization Posts from the past:

Literacy Stations
Math materials
Room Decoration
Student Book Boxes
Back to School Night
School Supplies
Weekly Papers

That is a lot of organization. What do you do in your classroom? Go link up and share!